Italy: Imperial Rome: 4 of 12
There are some blocks laying about, waiting for the reconstruction:
It turns out there was a canvas "roof" for the Colosseum that required the efforts of a thousand sailors to deploy.
Nearby, the Arch of Constantine:
And on the other side of the Arch, a view from the Colosseum of the Arch of Titus, showing the Arch (of course), the Forum (to the right), and the crowd. Note that this is late April, at the beginning of "the season". Note also that the Arch of Titus, like the Colosseum, is under construction:
And a view to show context: on the right, the Colosseum, center is the Arch of Constantine, and to the left can be seen the columns of the ruins of the Forum. The Arch of Titus is just out of the frame to the left:
A short walk and we loaded into the bus, and I caught Castel Sant'Angelo through the window. This was only a drive-by for us, but it would've been a nice extra stop:
Our next stop in Rome was the Piazza Navona... art and architectural masterpieces abound.
This Bernini creation, below, Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi , with its towering copy of an Egyptian obelisk, drew our attention immediately:
A side note... Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) was competing with a fellow artist Carlo Rainaldi (1611-1691) for who strongly dismissed Bernini's work. Rainaldi was the architect and sculptor for the church of Saint Agnese in Agone, and he lost the commission for the fountain in front of the church to Bernini. So, he created a statue for the facade which looked away from the fountain in cold disdain:
Here's a closer look:
And as we leave this segment, I was able to find an article regarding Bernini's disfavor, and then his selection, to do the fountain:
Bernini’s daring in the design for the Fountain of the Four Rivers occurred when his professional reputation was in tatters. His design for the bell towers at Saint Peter’s Basilica had
failed to take into account the unstable ground under Catholicism’s
most important church and the towers had cracked. Innocent X canceled
the commission and seized Bernini’s assets. [2]
Bernini’s position after the disaster at Saint Peter’s was a far cry from the favor he enjoyed under Urban VIII, the previous pontiff. The artist found himself rejected by much of the commissioning class. Innocent X did not invite Bernini to submit a design for the Piazza Navona Fountain. Filippo Baldinucci, Bernini’s 17th-century biographer, describes the artist resorting to subterfuge to place his design in front of the pope. Bernini built a model and asked his friend Prince Niccolò Ludovisi to set it in a room where the pope would see it. When Innocent X stopped to admire the model, only then did Ludovisi inform him who had made it. The Pamphili pope acknowledged the superiority of the design and awarded Bernini the commission.
from https://smarthistory.org/gian-lorenzo-bernini-fountain-four-rivers/
Right around the corner, almost, the Pantheon, minus a few tourists rubbed out by the magic of post processing:
Inside, the breathtaking dome:
And of course, art (fear not, just one pic), St Anne and the Blessed Virgin:
Still on a walking tour, our next stop was the famous Trevi Fountain. No we did not throw any coins, choosing to keep our distance from the selfie/TicToc frenzy:
Our last stop on this glorious day was at the Piazza di Spagna, the site of the famous Spanish Steps, which I did not capture on "film"... something about visual and mental fatigue, methinks...
Italy Posts (click to navigate):
Context, intro, meandrie avertimentis
Imperial Rome
Rome, St. Peter's Square & Borghese Gallery
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